The Foreign Service Journal, December 2021

THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL | DECEMBER 2021 17 E mployees of the National Archives and Records Administration handle billions of pages of documents that contain historical and evidentiary information created by the federal government. The Text Message blog is a vehicle for staff at NARA’s many facilities across the country to share their knowledge and discoveries within that trove with the public. The Oct. 4 edition, contributed by David Langbart, archivist in textual reference at the branch in College Park, Maryland, is of special interest to Foreign Service folks. A century ago, in 1921, the State Department sent a circular to all posts soliciting examples of how “the Diplomatic Service is of use to the economic interests of this country,” among other queries. Joseph Grew—then U.S. minister to Denmark and later a senior official in the Department of State who was instrumental in the professionalization of the Foreign Service following the 1924 passage of the Rogers Act—sub- mitted a lengthy, detailed response that still resonates a century later. Langbart’s Text Message blog post about the survey excerpts Grew’s answers to each question, while including a link to an image of the complete text at the end of each edited section. In July, Langbart received the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations’ first-ever Anna K. Nelson Prize in Archival Excellence. Blog of the Month: The Text Message (text-message.blogs.archives.gov) The appearance of a particular site or podcast is for information only and does not constitute an endorsement. the State Department in the best pos- sible position to confront the challenges facing our country, and we need to build, support, and protect the workforce that makes everything that we do possible.” Pandora Papers Reveal U.S. Hypocrisy T he “Pandora Papers, ” almost 12 million documents and just under three terabytes of data obtained by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, is the largest trove of leaked offshore documents in history. One revelation has thrown a particu- lar challenge to American policymak- ers: the fact that the U.S. itself serves as a tax haven for hundreds of elites from around the world, including sitting country leaders, such as King Abdullah II of Jordan, and Russian elites close to President Vladimir Putin. Many are using a complex network of secret companies to move money and assets to avoid pay- ing taxes and, sometimes, to conceal the proceeds of criminality. As the ICIJ notes in its investigation: “A burgeoning American trust industry is increasingly sheltering the assets of inter- national millionaires and billionaires by promising levels of protection and secrecy that rival or surpass those offered in overseas tax havens. That shield, which is near-absolute, has insulated the industry frommeaningful oversight and allowed it to forge new footholds in U.S. states.”